Consultation about Cellar Gender Policy

Dear Members,

I am consulting about the Cellar's Gender rules.  Please tell me your opinion by writing it in a notecard and sending it to me (open my profile and drag the notecard you have written onto it). 

Background

The Cellar is supposed to be only for women.  As much as possible it should be a place where a female ethos and behaviour reigns (emphasis on relationships, a caring and connected community helping and supporting each other, no instant sex etc.).  There are some at the Cellar with bad or even truamatic experiences with RL males, and it would be nice to think they had a little protection from such behaviour at the Cellar.

Here I must add a couple of personal notes. I have a F2M Transexual friend in RL (was a girl now a man, operation, married etc.), and through him I have learnt what they go through.  I do believe that it is possible to be born with a male brain and a female body (or the other way around).  I would like those who *do* have a female brain to be allowed into the Cellar.  Secondly several people who are very dear to me have arrived at D/s in SL in a quite a depressed state, yet aware of submissive urges in themselves.  I would like the Cellar to be a place where such people feel they can be themselves but within a community that provided them with friends, advice and care.

Of course these two things are difficult.   It is impossible to stop males who are just pretending to be female coming to the Cellar.  Equally it is very difficult to seperate those that are genuinely transgender (female brain) from those that just want to causually try being female.   It must be the case that a significant proportion of those at the Cellar are RL men, estimates range from 10-90%, there is no real way of knowing.  I hope its under 40% since if its above this the club's ethos probably cant be maintained in the long run.

Current Policy

The current policy is no males but with the following exception (in the detailed club information):

Although RL men are not wanted at the cellar, and no male behaviour/appearence will be tollerated (including the use of penises), genuine m->f transexuals are welcome, provided (1) they reveal this to me and discuss this with me before entering the club (2) they live totally as a woman in all respects and (3) they reveal this fact to anyone before becoming intimate (there are some at the club with traumas due to abuse by men so this is a sensitive subject).

The idea of this was not to make it easy for RL males who were pretending to be TS, so that I knew who they were and could keep an eye open on them, that they had to know about TS issues and processes and they understood the importance of not being intimate with others before telling them.  

My General Aims for the Club's Policy

My aims in this policy are several:

1. To maintain a "female atmosphere", that emphasises underlying respect, tollerance, relationships, friendship, safety and mutual care/support.
2. To help provide a home (to the limited extent possible a safe home) for women with D/s leanings who want to avoid men, in particular for those who have suffered trauma due to their treatedment by men.
3. To be an open, friendly, welcoming place that is simply nice to come to, helpful and inclusive to newcomers and newbies
4. To be as tollerant of people's various desires and orientations as possible whilst emphasising the importance of safety and care
5. I dont want to even try to police the gender of those at the club, or have to investigage claims about an av's sex if there is not incident or noone is harmed (quite apart from this being against the SL TOS).  Rather I would like rules etc. that encourages the self-selection of those who frequent the place.
   

The Consultation

I am asking members what they think of the current policy, as well as if and how they think it should be changed.  

Some particular issues:

• Should the TS males at the club declare this in their profile?
  
• Should we be trying at all to keep the club female?
  
• Do people want to maintain the illusion that all at the club are RL female?
  
• How best to keep the maximum pressure on RL males at the club to behave in a suitable fashion?
  
• How to ensure the Club can protect its more vulnerable members?
  
• How to preserve the ethos and atmosphere of the Club?

Please send me your comments!

Thank you.

San Mauvaise